


Belief

by pherryt



Series: Old Guard Bingo [1]
Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Hope, M/M, Soulmates, Sweetness, nile's knowledge and beliefs of the world is challenged (again)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-30
Updated: 2020-09-30
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:02:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26736319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pherryt/pseuds/pherryt
Summary: Nile definitely doesn't believe in Soulmates but finds the gang has a different perspective.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Series: Old Guard Bingo [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1945972
Comments: 14
Kudos: 175
Collections: The Old Guard Bingo





	Belief

**Author's Note:**

  * For [treefrogie84](https://archiveofourown.org/users/treefrogie84/gifts).



> This is it, my first foray into writing Old Gaurd Fics. I currently have 3 other snippets of various ideas i'm looking to see if they are expandable or not.
> 
> This goes to the Old Guard Bingo Square for Soulmates (thanks for the card frogie!) i'm dedicating my first work to you because it's your fault :P
> 
> also, why is it always so hard to tag the shorter things?
> 
> Also, also, why am I now in a fandom that one of the main words is a word I NEVER GET RIGHT? "Guard" is going to kill me.

“It’s amazing how in sync y’all are with each other - especially Nicky and Joe,” Nile said one day, after the others had declared her sword training finished for the day. It may be a little anachronistic, but it worked, and another skill wasn’t a bad thing to have. “I guess it comes from knowing each other so long.”

Andy shrugged, reaching for the coffee pot that had finished percolating just as they got inside, Nicky bustling about to make sandwiches while Joe flowed around him to help, proving Niles point.

“That’s part of it,” Andy agreed. “But mostly it’s because Joe and Nicky are soulmates.”

Nile started laughing before noticing that none of the others were. Andy looked dead serious. Then again, she often did. 

“There's no such thing,” she said. “I mean, they are adorably,  _ disgustingly _ in love, anyone could see that from space. But  _ soulmates _ ?” she scoffed. “Those are fairy tales.”

Andy rolled her eyes as Nicky and Joe chuckled and leaned into each other. Bumping shoulders didn’t even slow them down any as they continued to make lunch together.

“Nile,  _ you _ are a fairytale,” Andy pointed out. “Is it so hard to believe that if immortals can exist, so can soulmates?”

“Just…” Nile floundered, but she didn't really have a good argument against that. Except... “It’s just that, soulmates were in all the old stories and shit. It was _ everywhere _ and suddenly it wasn’t anymore. Don’t you think if soulmates were real, people would  _ know  _ about them?”

“It's rare,” Joe conceded, as he and Nicky set out plates of sandwiches on the coffee table before settling onto the couch together, pressing against each other as they ate. “Even back then, though not quite as rare as these days. You have to remember, Nile, that fairy tales, myths, legends - all of these things often have some basis in truth, if you're able to unravel the flowery prose in tongues so ancient scholars these days have no  _ true  _ understanding of them.”

Nicky and Andy nodded sagely at Joe’s words. Because, of course, this was not a problem these three would have, Nile admitted to herself.

“So you guys, you’re really for real saying... that soulmates are  _ real?” _ she asked, letting herself drop into the recliner to stare at the couple on the couch. Nicky nudged a plate across the little table at her and she took it absentmindedly.

“We are,” Nicky agreed. “Like Joe said, it was far more common in the earlier days. It’s like the gift of our immortality - we don't know where it comes from, or why, and one day it just... isn’t there anymore. When the prevalence of soulmates waned, the truth of it simply… faded away.”

She shook her head. “But  _ why _ ?”

Nicky shrugged. "Who knows. But as long as I have Joe, I don't care. Although it saddens me to know there are people who will never know the same depths of love, the pure happiness that we share. He completes me in ways I never knew I needed till he did.”

Joe gave him a soft look, their hands reaching out at the same time to capture the other, fingers threading together, and then the two of them fell to conversing softly in... Italian, this time, Nile thought. Maybe. But it was the  _ old _ Italian. Ancient. She'd learned to recognize what it sounded like with how often they spoke it to each other after, Andy identifying it for her. All Nile knew for certain was that what little she might have picked up in school if she'd chosen to learn Italian would have been useless to her here.

Not that she wanted to intrude on them, the words obviously private to them, almost a love language, she supposed. Or maybe it  _ was _ .

How special it must be to have a language that was all their own? And almost literally, for the number of people on Earth likely to know Italian that old - spoken, no less - were probably gathered in this very room. 

She didn't even know if Booker knew it, having been fairly young compared to the others, though his 200 years had still felt like a chasm when she first met him. 

“How does it even work? How’d y’all know you were soulmates?”

“What do the stories say, Nile?” Andy asked.

“Depends on the story. It always seems to change from culture to culture.” Nile thought about it a bit. “Think the most common was a mark - matching marks that burned hot when soulmates touched.”

Andy hummed, but didn’t answer. Nile waited her out, crossing her arms over her chest and raising an eyebrow at Andy. Andy smirked. “Well, you’re wrong and you’re right.”

“What? That makes no sense,” Nile protested.

“It was the most common declaration of a soulmate,” Andy said, “But it was hardly the only one. The ways you could find your soulmate varied - as you say - from culture to culture and even person to person. Belief held a great deal of power over how it presented but each was equally valid, equally irrefutable. As long as you believed.”

“That’s Joe’s theory about why Soulmates are so much rarer, these days,” Nicky said, nudging at Joe.

Joe nodded. “People stopped believing. And that is a sad thing, Nile, when people stop believing in love, in magic, in fairy tales. Life grows just that much duller around the edges, and it creeps into everything, given time.”

“That’s just… sad,” Nile said softly. She wondered if she dared believe. Andy was right, after all. She was immortal already, which was already an impossibility, what was one more improbable thing to be believed?

She eyed Andy thoughtfully as they ate their sandwiches, the conversation flowing to a natural stop at this point. Andy had lost her immortality recently, during a time when she had barely been living, according to Joe and Nicky. 

According to Booker.

Was it possible that it was Andy’s own mentality that had ended her immortality?

And could a restoration of purpose and belief bring it back?

Belief was a powerful thing. Nile really hoped it did. She’d only just met Andy, Nile wasn’t ready for her to go.

It wasn’t till hours later that she realized she never did find out how Joe and Nicky had realized they were soulmates. But that was okay. If they wanted to keep it to themselves, she’d respect that.

Besides, she had who knew how many centuries ahead of her with them. She was guessing she’d find out eventually. They had centuries - even millennia - of tales to tell, she wouldn't expect to get all of them before the first month was even out.


End file.
